


liar, liar (tell me true)

by Elsin



Series: rule of the beasts [1]
Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: (Harrow), 5 + 1 Things, 5 Things, Angst With A Bittersweet Ending, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Friendship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Light Angst, Missing Scene, Post-Canon, Secrets, i mean when s2 comes out it will be totally au but for now it's canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-20
Updated: 2018-12-20
Packaged: 2019-09-23 08:24:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17076791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elsin/pseuds/Elsin
Summary: Five times Rayla didn't tell Callum and Ezran about their father's death, and the one time she did.





	liar, liar (tell me true)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



_i._

A blood-red ribbon falls to the forest floor, silent, final.  A blood-red bird of smoke flies overhead as Rayla looks up, and her stomach twists.  So.  The king of Katolis is dead.

Callum  asks her if something is wrong.  She denies it.

 _Your father is dead_ , she thinks but does not say.  She should tell him, she knows.  He deserves to know.  But her tongue has turned to lead, and her lips have gone all numb, and she cannot find it in her to say the cursed words.

The princes do not question her further, and they keep moving.  If the egg is not returned, then all of this will have been for nothing.

 

_ii._

The river is calm and mild today, and for that, Rayla is grateful.  That’s about _all_ she’s grateful for in this situation, but still—it’s something, at least.  Learning what Callum said about her, last night, stung far more than she’d have expected it to.  He was lying, she knows that.  But it’s how easily he sold it to his aunt that really hits her hardest.  That, or it’s just the motion of the boat making her sicker than she thought it would.

 _Is it really so different to what you thought of humans a week ago?_ a small, nasty voice inside her asks, and she pushes it away.  It has a point, and for that, she hates it.

“I’m gonna ask you five questions,” says Callum, and against her better judgement she agrees to it.

Talking about Xadia, to these humans who know nothing yet are so openly enchanted by it is nice, she’ll admit.  She only hopes that the next question—

“What are your parents like?”

“They’re dead,” she says shortly, because it’s easier than telling the truth.

Then there’s the waterfall ahead of them, and she can hardly think at all, but at least—well.  At least the second question was about _her_ parents, and not about what happened to _theirs_.

 

_iii._

Ezran curls up in his cloak next to the fire, boogey-berries up his nose, and is soon asleep.  Callum, though, is still sitting near the cave’s mouth, and Rayla settles herself next to him.

“You know him better than me,” she says to Callum.  “How’s he holding up?”

“Not too bad,” says Callum.  “He’s putting on a bit of a brave face, but then again aren’t we all?  Anyway, I think he’s too relieved that the egg’s not lost or completely frozen to let himself be shaken by going into the lake himself.”

“He did choose to do it,” Rayla adds, and Callum nods.

“There’s that, too.”

Her own parents were at best cowards and at worst traitors.  Even if they’re not dead—and she doesn’t honestly know _what_ they are, anymore; there’s been no news since that fateful night—they’re dead to _her_.  But Callum and Ezran, she knows, had something much more precious with their parents.

“What was she like?” she asks Callum, quietly, so as to not wake Ezran.

“Who?” asks Callum.  She thinks maybe he knows who she means already, but wants confirmation.  That much, she can give him.

“Your mother.”

“Oh.”  Maybe he didn’t know, then.  He leans back against the wall of the cave, his eyes distant.  “She was… she was great.  She loved all of us with all her heart.  You know how Ezran is with the jelly tarts?”

“I remember the jelly handprints,” says Rayla, and Callum gives a small, half-choked chuckle.

“He got it from her.  She might’ve loved them even more than he does.  And…”  He looks down, to where his pencil is drawing spirals in an empty corner of the page.  “She loved magic, too, or at least the idea of it.  Not dark magic—she never said she hated it, but she didn’t love it.  She always wanted to see Xadia, though.”

“Well, you can do it for her, then,” says Rayla.  She hopes that this isn’t a misstep, something she shouldn’t say.

“I suppose,” says Callum, and he doesn’t exactly seem cheered but he doesn’t seem too down, either, so she counts it as not a mistake.

“You should get some rest too,” she says.

“What about you?”

“I’ll keep watch.  I’m stronger than you are, especially at night, and anyway I don’t need that much sleep.”  Besides, if they keep talking, she’s sure to let slip something that she shouldn’t.

“All right,” says Callum, closing his sketchbook and getting to his feet.  “Wake me when the moonlight starts to dim.  Even if you don’t need as much sleep you still must need _some_.”

Rayla nods, and he lies down next to his little brother.  She stares out into the snowy darkness, and her stomach twists from something much darker than hunger.

_What will they say, when they find out about the king?_

She sent Callum to bed because she was sure if things went on she’d find herself saying, _Your father is dead.  Your father is dead and my people killed him_.  And she can’t tell that to just Callum; Ezran needs to know too, and she doesn’t know if she can say it twice. So she has to wait.

At least, that’s what she tells herself.  Maybe, on some level, it’s even true.

 

_iv._

Now Ezran knows what a failure she is at actually doing her damn job, and she doesn’t know why it’s surprised her that he thinks it’s a good thing.  Maybe she’s just not used to the moral compasses of human children.  Still, while he knows that she failed her mission to kill him, she doesn’t know if he’s put together that his father was the other target yet, nor if he’s realized what her unbound wrist means.

He deserves to know as much as Callum does, if not more.  King Harrow was his father, by birth and by choice both, and his death means that Ezran should be inheriting the crown now.  Instead he’s off on a desperate mission to return a stolen egg to his enemies.  The people who _killed his father_. He needs to know.

“Ezran,” she says, hesitant, heart beating a tattoo against her ribs.  “There’s something you should know.  Something I meant to tell you before you fell through the ice.”

“What is it?”

“It’s—well, it’s that—”  Her voice catches, and she finds, to her frustration, that she can’t go on.

“Hey,” says Ezran.  “It’s okay.  You don’t have to tell me now, if it’s too much.”  She’d argue with him, tell him he deserves and needs to know this, but—well.  Her tongue has turned to lead again, so instead of answering she turns her mind to surveying the ground nearby.

“Hey, guys!  I think that thing may be gone!” she calls.  She’ll tell them, both of them, soon.  Just not right now.

 

_v._

Purple stars fall all around them, and Rayla’s hand, freed from its binding, is still tender and tingling, though even now the swelling is starting to go down.  She’s sure that if she took off her half-glove she’d have dark bruises around her wrist, but the color in her hand and arm is fading already. Her friends (and isn’t that a concept, a Moonshadow assassin friends with human princes) are happy now, playing with Zym and the pretty lights, but she cannot let this last.

She needs to tell them; there’s been enough stalling.  They have to know that their father is dead.  Her palms feel damp and clammy; she wipes them on her pants.  She swallows down her fear, and opens her mouth to begin.

“You must go,” says Lujanne, and Rayla snaps her mouth shut, turning to look at her.

“Why?” asks Ezran.

“Is something wrong?”  That’s Callum.

“What’s happened?”  Ellis.

Neither Zym nor Rayla says a word.  Zym can’t, not yet, and Rayla… Rayla can see the look on Lujanne’s face.  Something’s _definitely_ wrong.

“Look,” says Lujanne, and she points to the top of Mt. Kaelik, where a purple arc begins.  Following its trail across the sky, Rayla sees that it leads… to them.  Oh.

“It’s a tracking spell,” says Callum.  “It has to be.”  Rayla turns in time to see Ezran give his brother an odd look.

“How do you know?”

“Look,” says Callum, now a bit flustered, “I—I may not have done magic before I got the primal stone, but I did do some reading on it at times, and that?  That’s a tracking spell.”

“You cannot stay here,” says Lujanne.  “Go down the other side of the mountain.”  She pauses, and in her hands builds a silvery glow; Rayla averts her eyes as it intensifies, and when she looks back, Lujanne is holding a silver rabbit in her hands.  “Follow the rabbit; she will show you the way to go until you reach the base of the mountain and are beyond my power.  I will stall those who search for you as best as I can, but I cannot keep them forever.  There are some things which even illusions cannot do.”

“Can’t you make… I don’t know, illusion-us?” asks Callum, but Rayla is shaking her head even before Lujanne answers.  She’s not a mage herself, but she knows enough about Moonshadow magic to know that it won’t work the way Callum wants it to.

“I could,” says Lujanne, “but the copies would not stand up to scrutiny.  You would not buy more than a few minutes with them.”

“Oh,” says Callum.  “There goes that idea, then.”

“There is a way back to the village from the base of the mountain,” says Lujanne.  “When the silver rabbit turns north, follow it,” she says to Ellis.  “The rest of you will be on your own from there; my power does not stretch far enough, and I do not know the area well enough, to help you past that.  All I can say is that if you head southeast you will reach the sea, and the sea is the easiest way to cross from Katolis into Xadia.”

“Thank you, Lujanne,” says Rayla, and moves to stand next to the silver rabbit.

“Thank me by leaving this place, as swiftly as you can,” says Lujanne, and they set off after the rabbit, down the dark, unknown slopes of the snowy mountain.

 

_\+ i./vi._

The boat scrapes ashore in Xadia, and Rayla practically flings herself from it.  Callum and Ezran laugh at her, of course, but she doesn’t care; after so long on the human side, she’d almost forgotten what it feels like to have magic humming in your bones.  She remembers now, and her head is practically swimming with it.

“Zym,” she says to the young dragon, who’s leapt to the sand to stand beside her, “we’re _home_.”  Of course they’re not all the way home, not yet, but they’re in Xadia, and there’s magic in the air, and for now, that’s enough for Rayla.

“Whoa,” says Callum, and as Ezran’s boots touch the sand he inhales sharply.

“You said there was magic everywhere in Xadia,” says Ezran, eyes and voice alight with wonder, “but you never said it was like _this_.”

“It’s not the easiest thing to put into words,” says Rayla.  “Callum, aren’t you going to get out of the boat?”  Callum hesitates, then nods, and steps out.  He doesn’t show as much of a reaction, but his eyes do widen, and Rayla smiles at him.

“This is… _nothing_ like home,” Callum finally says.

“I know,” says Rayla.  After a moment, she adds softly, “I missed it.”

They drag the boat up the beach and hide it in the underbrush; with Soren and Claudia pursuing them on horseback, they’ll probably be forced to either wait longer to go by sea or find a land route to Xadia, which will slow them somewhat, but there’s no point in making things _easier_ on their pursuers.  After that they set off into the vibrant forest.

A starlight redbird flies overhead, and Rayla laughs in delight to see it.  They aren’t as common in northern Xadia, where the Moonshadow elves most commonly dwell, and though Rayla’s heard stories about them being common in the south, she never believed them until now.

By the time the sun is sinking in the west, staining the sea and distant mountains of Katolis red, they’ve left the trees behind them and have climbed up into the hills.  The night air is warm, and the skies are clear, so they don’t bother finding better shelter than a shallow hollow under a ledge, where they sit and watch as day sinks down to night.

Rayla stares at the bloodstained mountains in the distance, and knows that the time has come; she cannot keep hiding the truth from the princes.  She takes a deep breath and pushes away her nerves; they will know in time, and they must know before they interact with any resident of Xadia.  Since they are now _in_ Xadia, she is the only one left to tell them.

“Guys,” she says softly, “there’s something I have to tell you.”

“What is it?”  Callum sits near her, though not too close.

“Is this what you wanted to tell me in the tree?” asks Ezran, painfully observant.

“Yes,” says Rayla.  “I… I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have kept this from you for so long.  It was selfish of me, and it was wrong.”  She takes a deep breath, and looks back and forth between the two princes before settling her gaze on Zym in the middle of their little semi-circle.  She begins.

“I already told you what the binding on my left wrist was for,” she says.  “What I didn’t tell you was that there were two bindings that night—one for each target.  One for Prince Ezran, and one… one for King Harrow.”  Their gazes are calm and steady, when she chances a glance at them, but still she looks back at Zym before going on.  “As we ran from the castle, my right wrist’s binding turned red and fell away.  Overhead, a red smoke-bird flew by, with a red ribbon as its message.”  She takes another deep breath.

“King Harrow—your father—he’s dead,” she says.  She draws her knees up to her chest, hating the next part, needing to say it.  “And it was my team that killed him.”

For a moment after she finishes, there’s a terrible, awful silence, and she’s sure that at any moment the princes will rage at her, tell her how she’s betrayed them, how she’s the worst kind of friend.  Then there’s a rustle of cloth, and the next thing she knows Callum’s hand is on her shoulder, warm and comforting, and she’s not leaning on him but she’s also not pulling away.  She relaxes her grip on her knees a bit, and carefully looks up at him.

“Rayla,” he says, softer and far more gentle than she deserves, “I know.  I’ve known for a while.”

“What?”  How could he know?  She’s never said anything about it before, she’s sure of that, so how could he—

“The night we left the castle, I knew he was probably gone,” says Callum, still in that gentle tone, “and I was sure of it, that day on the lake.”

“Oh,” says Rayla, for lack of anything else.  All this time, and he already knew.  Of course he did. He was up in the tower, after all.  She looks over at Ezran, then, who isn’t looking at her.  He’s looking up at the star-covered sky, and what little she can see of his face is sad but also not terribly surprised.

“I didn’t want it to be true,” says Ezran.  “I mean—you only had one ribbon, and you said it was for me.  And I knew that Dad was a—a _target_ —too.  But I didn’t—I didn’t want—”  He swipes at his eyes with the sleeve of his coat, and Rayla realizes that he’s crying.  She doesn’t know what to do about that; she’s an assassin, at least nominally.  Comforting crying human children was _not_ part of her training.

Suddenly her shoulder is cold, and she sees that Callum has stood to make his way over to Ezran.  He wraps his arms around his little brother, and Rayla suddenly feels unspeakably awkward; she stands and quietly slips away.

Above the ledge, the night air is ever-so-slightly cool with the faintest whisper of a breeze, and the moon is rising over Xadia.  Ordinarily it would be a beautiful night; then again, ordinarily Rayla wouldn’t feel so hollow inside.  Angrily she wipes her half-glove against her eyes; what right does she have to cry over a friendship lost when below her, there are two princes who’ve just learned that their father is definitely dead?  They both had already surmised as much, but there’s knowing and then there’s _knowing_.  She’s given them the latter.

So lost in thought is she, it’s only when Zym is climbing into her lap and Ezran and Callum are sitting down to either side of her that she registers anyone’s approaching at all.  She startles rather badly.

“Sorry,” says Callum.  “Didn’t mean to surprise you.”  He falls silent, and for a moment everything’s quiet.  If this is the last moment of their friendship, Rayla’s glad it’s a quiet one, and she savors it.

“It’s not your fault,” says Ezran, and Rayla can’t help but stare at him.

“They were my team,” she says.

“Yeah, but… you didn’t know the truth.  And when you learned it, you risked _everything_ to stop them.  You saved me.  You tried to stall the others long enough to save him.  You couldn’t have done anything else, so you _shouldn’t blame yourself_ for it.”  He’s glaring at her now, and she realizes that she’s maybe crying again.

“I’m still sorry,” she says softly, and to her right Callum laughs, ever so slightly.

“We know,” he says.  “You think we don’t?  Of course we know.  But it’s still not your _fault_.”

Rayla isn’t sure if she believes them, but with the dragon prince on her lap and two sets of human arms wrapped around her, she isn’t sure that it matters so much anymore.

In the morning, there will be mountains to climb and fields to cross to get Azymondias home and end this pointless war.  In the morning, in the light of dawn, maybe the princes of Katolis won’t feel towards her as they do now.  But for now, for tonight, they’re still her friends and they still believe in her.

And for now, that’s enough.

**Author's Note:**

> I have _no_ idea how the name of the tallest mountain in Katolis is supposed to be spelled, so I went with "Kaelik."
> 
> Also, I would like to profusely thank Dalia for betaing this for me despite knowing nothing about the show.


End file.
